


expressions of human sexuality in contemporary literature

by brattyloser



Category: Rooster Teeth/Achievement Hunter RPF
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-10-28
Updated: 2014-10-28
Packaged: 2018-02-22 22:40:50
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,977
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2524316
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/brattyloser/pseuds/brattyloser
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>If Michael knew that he was going to be wasting his morning standing in an empty lecture hall at 6:59am, he would have at least grabbed breakfast beforehand. Leave it to him and his rotten luck to somehow fall between the cracks of his school’s listserv.</p>
            </blockquote>





	expressions of human sexuality in contemporary literature

**Author's Note:**

> There's an tumblr post about aus that has a "we’re the only ones who didn’t get the email about class being canceled" au. So here's a raychael fic for that.

If Michael knew that he was going to be wasting his morning standing in an empty lecture hall at 6:59am, he would have at least grabbed breakfast beforehand. He pulled out his phone as he sat down in a seat in the back row. Scrolling through his university email account proved useless. There wasn’t a message from his professor about cancelling class this morning, but the empty seats and eerie silence that surrounded Michael suggested otherwise.

Michael shot a quick text to Kerry, the guy he had met on the first day of class and had studied with a few times this semester. As Michael waited for a reply, he drummed his fingers on the desk and looked around the lecture hall again. It was weird how quiet the room was with no bodies to absorb the sound.

His phone buzzed. Kerry was clearly still half asleep because his reply, while coherent, was rife with typos.

_no clss prof emaled last nigh_

Michael rolled his eyes. Leave it to him and his rotten luck to somehow fall between the cracks of his school’s listserv. He slipped off his backpack and put it on the desk as he unzipped the zipper. He shuffled through the contents of his bag for a moment before pulling out the textbook for the class. After jogging across campus in the early morning chill, all traces of drowsiness had been chased away, so he might as well use his newfound free time to study.

It was nearly twenty minutes after seven, while Michael was flipping through the text and highlighting passages, when something that could only be described as a mess of a human being – mussed hair, crooked glasses, and shirt on inside out type of mess – stumbled through the lecture hall doors.

The walking disaster, a boy who looked about Michael’s age, glanced around the empty hall while he tried to catch his breath. Did he run all the way across campus? The guy dropped his backpack on the floor and spoke with twelve times the frustration Michael felt minutes ago, “Are you fucking kidding me?”

Michael put down his highlighter. “Yeah,” he said, and the guy must not have seen him because he jumped nearly twenty feet in the air before turning to look at Michael, “Guess there’s no lecture today. Class is cancelled and we showed up like a couple of nerds.”

The mess of a boy gave Michael a once over, surveying him from head to toe and adjusting his glasses so they sat on his nose right. He looked a little less like a mess when he did that. Just a little.

“How long have you been here?”

Michael shrugged and pulled out his phone, checking the time. “Fifteen minutes give or take.”

The guy gave him a weird look and the way his eyebrows furrowed just past his ruffled bangs was pretty attractive. “What the fuck? Why didn’t you go back to bed?”

Michael shrugged, “I’m already up, right?”

He stared at Michael for a beat, like he wanted to say something particularly offensive at Michael’s expense. He must have thought better of it though and simply picked up his backpack and swung it over his shoulder. “Fucking weirdo,” he muttered as he turned to leave.

Michael wasn’t phased by the stranger’s words. He knew how rude people who weren’t early risers could be. Lindsay had straight up refused to take this class with him because she promised she would kill him and his “wakey wakey eggs and bakey ass” before October.

Michael picked up his highlighter and set to go back to what he was doing before the cute yet grumpy pile of unwashed laundry came barreling into his impromptu study time.

“I could always use more study time to be honest. This class is more brutal than I thought it’d be.” He was talking more to himself than the stranger at that point, but the guy stopped in his tracks anyway.

He turned back to face Michael and tilted his head slightly, “You too?”

The page Michael was on had a key term bolded about halfway down the second paragraph. He highlighted the word and accompanying definition. The yellow ink glistened wet against the thin paper. “Yeah. Think I’ve got the hang of it now though. If I’m lucky I’ll pull a B out of my ass, but I’m really just aiming for a C at this point.”

The ink dried dull and Michael turned the page. The stranger’s shoulders dropped as he shuffled his feet. “I’ll be lucky if I fucking pass. I hate shit like this, Lit and reading and whatever. I hate this class.”

Michael looked up at the stranger. He looked small and sad standing there, staring at his checkered Vans. Who even wore Vans anymore? What, was this dude like sixteen? Whatever, it wasn’t like Michael was too caught up in his own academics to not offer a helping hand where one was clearly needed.

“We’ve got an hour before the next class comes in. Wanna study together?”

The guy visibly perked up, head snapping up to look at Michael and read his face for the sincerity that was most definitely there. When he realized Michael was being serious he tried to school his own expression into something more casual.

“Yeah, I guess,” he said with a shrug and Michael swallowed down a laugh at his transparency. “I’m Ray, by the way.”

Michael hoped when he smiled, it was _too_ smug, “Michael.”

What was only supposed to be a casual, unplanned study session for Michael somehow turned into nearly an hour of him tutoring some kid who had apparently been in the same class since the start of the semester. Michael wrote on the chalkboard and highlighted passages in Ray’s textbook and even when Ray asked really obvious questions, Michael didn’t laugh. Not after the first time at least, because he felt really bad when Ray’s ears went red and he muttered “fuck it” as he tried to pack up his stuff and leave.

It was after Ray groaned dejectedly and slammed his face into his open textbook that Michael decided it was time for a break. He put down the felt eraser, a stubby stick of chalk still between his fingers, and tried to brush some of the dust off his hand as we walked over to where Ray was lamenting from his seat in the second row. The chalk dust billowed and Michael snorted to get in out of his nose. Fucking old-ass lecture halls and their old-ass chalkboards.

He leaned against the desk in the row in front of Ray and crossed his arms. “You really hate this class, don’t you?”

Ray looked up, chin still nestled in the spine of his book and glasses askew, “Don’t _you_?”

Michael shrugged. “It’s not that bad. Better than fucking O Chem. There’s this kid in my mythology class who tells me horror stories.”

Ray sat up straighter as he adjusted his glasses, “Yeah, well, science and math I can bullshit. Literature though? Fuck that.” He ran a hand through his hair and it curled in all different directions. “I hate reading aloud too, why does he keep making us do that? And how the hell am I supposed to know what the author’s intent was? Like, _fuck_.”

The lecture hall was quiet for a moment, save Ray’s slightly labored breathing. Michael carefully watched the way Ray’s face was flushed in the wake of him articulating his frustration. “Wow,” Michael said after a beat, “You really _do_ hate this class.”

Ray chuckled. That was good. Michael didn’t like it when Ray was frustrated; he got this weird lost look on his face and it made Michael feel bad. Ray leaned back in his seat and wiped the palms of his hands on the fabric of his shorts.

“My friend from high school talked me into it. Then she dropped it for Photography _without telling me_. Fucking dick move,” he rolled his eyes, “She says she forgot, but I know Tina. She’s trying to get me to meet other people and shit. Which sucks.”

Michael smiled smugly. “Well, you met me didn’t you?”

“Yeah, I guess you’re not too bad.” Ray said with a small smile of his own. He picked up his pencil and started spinning it between his fingers, “But I think she was thinking more of a girlfriend or boyfriend or significant other or something. Y’know, someone romantic.”

Michael’s smile turned downright devilish. He reached up and scratched the back of his neck and, yes, he was very much aware that the hem of his shirt rode up and revealed his stomach when he did so. He rhythmically tapped the stub of chalk against the desk. “Well, you met me didn’t you?”

Ray stopped fiddling with his pencil. He stared at Michael like he was trying to process and reprocess what he said and then, suddenly, his whole face went red. “What?”

Michael tried to be as casual as possible, but his tapping increased in tempo and belied his cool exterior. “You and me. Bowling. Friday night. It’s gonna be me and a couple other people from my floor. I’ll even pay for your nachos. You in?”

Ray regained his composure remarkably fast. He shot Michael a smug yet slightly shaky smirk and said, “Why nachos? Why not a hot dog? Or did you just assume –”

“Fine,” Michael cut him off and noted the comfortable atmosphere between them that had settled in so easily, “I’ll buy you whatever you want, nachos or not. If you wanna be all-American and get a hamburger with chili fries, I’ll pay for it. Just be prepared to lose against me in bowling.”

“Yeah whatever, meet me on the court and then we’ll talk.”

The tapping stopped. Michael blinked. “Court…? They’re called lanes, Ray.”

Ray shrugged, “Eh, whatever.”

And Michael couldn’t help but shake his head and laugh at that. As he chuckled at Ray’s ridiculousness, he pulled out his phone and checked the time. It was almost time for the students in the next class to start filing in. Michael had somehow lost track of how long he and Ray had been in that stuffy old lecture hall.

“Welp,” Michael said as he pushed himself off the desk, “Looks like class is over for today, Ray. And just when I was literally seconds away from getting into your pants.”

Ray laughed, short and loud and endearing, at Michael’s admittedly off-the-cuff attempt at flirting. “Whatever, dude. You wish.”

Michael would take that as a win; that laugh was goddamn beautiful. He went to put the chalk back in its rightful place in the tray beneath the chalkboard and actually took the time to erase the remaining evidence of his and Ray’s study slash tutoring session together. When he started to pack up his stuff, he could hear Ray’s quiet shuffling behind him.

“Hey…” Ray started with a shaky voice. He was attempting to sound flippant, but the tremor beneath his words was nothing but nerves, “You, uh, you got a class after this?”

Michael zipped up his bag, slung it over his shoulder, and turned to face Ray, “Not until ten. Why?”

Ray shrugged again. He had the end of his pencil hanging between his teeth and he was looking everywhere but Michael’s face, “Wanna grab breakfast together?”

Michael grinned and swung his backpack strap over his shoulder. “Why, Ray,” he plucked the pencil from between Ray’s teeth, earning him a grunt and a surprised look, and tucked it behind his ear, “I thought you’d never ask.”

And with that, Michael headed out the door, Ray right on his heels, and wondered if Ray was a pancake or a waffle kind of guy as he thanked flaky professors and faulty email listservs.


End file.
